From National Geographic, "Out of Africa" Phrase in Use Since Ancient Greece.
Posted on February 20, 2003 06:12 AM. Filed under: environment.Out of Africa. The phrase is everywhere; used to title movies, books, magazine articles, art exhibits, conferences, lectures, and travel tours. It's used as shorthand in newspaper headlines and to describe anthropological and medical theories related to Africa.
But where did it come from?
Somewhat surprisingly, the phrase stems from an ancient Greek proverb. "There is always something new coming out of Africa," wrote Aristotle more than 2,300 years ago in his book on natural history.
Writing in The Journal of African History, Harvey Feinberg and Joseph B. Solodow trace the history and meaning of the proverb from its ancient beginnings to contemporary usage.
"It's a phrase even Africanists don't know the origin of, so we were interested in tracing how it got from the ancient world to our world," said Feinberg, who teaches African history at Southern Connecticut State University (SCSU). [continue]